Disgraced former Fox News host Tucker Carlson predicted that Donald Trump, now a convicted felon, will win the 2024 presidential election - if he isn’t killed first.
“This won’t stop Trump,” Mr Carlson wrote on X, following the verdict on Thursday afternoon.
“He’ll win the election if he’s not killed first. But it does mark the end of the fairest justice system in the world. Anyone who defends this verdict is a danger to you and your family.”
A Manhattan jury unanimously convicted Donald Trump on all felony counts of falsifying business records to cover up a payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 election.
Trump sat emotionless as the jury convicted him on 34 counts. But outside the courtroom on Thursday, he railed against the verdict. “This was a rigged, disgraceful trial,” the former president said.
The real verdict is going to be November 5 by the people, and they know what happened here.”
He added: “I’m a very innocent man.”
Trump is the first convicted felon to run for the White House. He will return to Manhattan criminal court on July 11 for sentencing, days before he is expected to be selected as the GOP party’s nominee for president at the Republican National Convention.
Carlson has regularly shown public support for the former president. During his time as an anchor on Fox News, he spread lies that the 2020 election had been rigged alongside fellow hosts Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham.
However, filings in a lawsuit against Fox News brought by Dominion Voting Systems in relation to the fake election claims, revealed Carlson had privately mocked Trump’s allies and said that he hated him.
The Fox News star was fired in the wake of that lawsuit. Fox was ordered to pay $787.5m to the voting machine manufacturer for spreading baseless claims about their company connected to Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The TV network did not give a public reason for his termination.
The former Fox personality was in the national spotlight earlier this year after he interviewed Russian president Vladimir Putin in Moscow. The interview came after Carlson spent years on Fox News and on social media railing against Ukraine and promoting Kremlin talking points about Russia’s war in Ukraine.
